TV review: Stellar cast jazzes up Netlfix’s ‘The Eddy’

Al Alexander More Content Now

Thursday

May 7, 2020 at 2:16 PMMay 7, 2020 at 2:16 PM

Add Damien Chazelle to the list of Oscar-winning directors dipping their toes into the TV stream, as the 35-year-old Rhode Islander enters the swirling, jazzy waves of “The Eddy.” It’s merely a splash, though; helming just the first two of eight episodes in the Netflix series about a nightclub owner under assault by thugs, police and - worst of all - a brooding teenage daughter whose dire efforts to connect with him are too often met by indifference.

The show, which begins streaming May 8, is much akin to Chazelle’s breakthrough film, “Whiplash,” in which the conflicts are not just set to a seductive jazz score, they ARE jazz: dreamy, fluid and capable of changing directions at the drop of a note. It keeps you on edge, running the scales and riffing on everything from domestic squabbles to murder and intrigue. And what a fine group Chazelle has assembled to play along, most notably Joanna Kulig, the golden-voiced chanteuse from 2018’s Oscar-nominated “Cold War,” and Andre Holland, the smoldering hunk from the film that must still give Chazelle nightmares, “Moonlight.”

They play estranged lovers flailing to keep their failed romance and work separate; he the co-owner of the middling Paris jazz club, The Eddy, and she the temperamental lead singer for the joint’s not-ready-for-prime-time house band. Theirs is very much one of those Sam-and-Diane things where the only two people unaware they belong together is them. But both are stubborn, especially Holland’s Elliot, a celebrated master of the jazz piano - think Chick Corea or Keith Jarrett - who dropped out of the New York scene and sought exile in France. In essence, he’s an (African) American in Paris, a place where he can maintain a low profile, yet remains susceptible to the occasional die-hard fan asking if he’ll ever make a comeback.

Even his savvy business partner, Farid (Tahar Rahim, star of the classic film, “A Prophet”) tugs at his sleeve to acquiesce and join the house band in hopes of attracting more customers. But Elliot isn’t having it, especially now that he’s been tasked with guardianship of his recovering-addict daughter, Julie (“The Hate U Give’s” Amandla Stenberg), who has long since worn out her welcome with her mother back in New York.

Holland is terrific at communicating the weight-of-the-world exhaustion heaped upon his character, yet never sacrifices the aura of hip/cool grandeur enveloping him. Just the way he violently sucks on the stub of a cigarette tells you how strong and confident Elliot is. The opening episode introduces him along with his many foibles. You shouldn’t like him - he’s surly, egotistical and often unpleasant - but you do, and that’s all Holland, best known for playing the adult Kevin in “Moonlight,” the film you’ll remember that first lost to Chazelle’s “La La Land” for Best Picture in 2017, then won after it became clear Faye Dunaway botched the presentation.

By the end of that first hour, capped by a shocking crime committed just outside The Eddy, you’re as hooked on the show as you are the song, also titled “The Eddy,” Elliot and Kulig’s Maja hammer out piece by little piece over the course of the episode. Like much of the music in “The Eddy,” it’s actually penned by Randy Kerber and Glen Ballard, the producer of Alanis Morissette’s Grammy-winning “Jagged Little Pill.” Their compositions are caviar for the ears, most of it played live on film to enhance the you-are-there feeling Chazelle aims to provoke.

It’s almost as dizzying as the jittery hand-held, 16mm photography, which like a sugared-up 5-year-old can’t stay still, swirling and jerking to and fro, often performing a head-spinning 360 to give you a full sweep of whatever room you’re in. There’s even a chaotic chase in which the camera stays just behind Holland as he runs after a mysterious figure he’s certain wants to harm him or his daughter. It just might be the first TV segment requiring Dramamine to negotiate.

It’s also neat how the multi-lingual series seeks to play with the idea of all the main characters being Paris transplants: Elliot and Julie from the U.S.; Maja from Poland and Farid from Algeria. Just like jazz, an art form born in the U.S. but long since appropriated by Parisians, the core four are afloat in alienation and a struggle to fit in. It’s quite compelling, as is the decision to locate the club in one of Paris’ dodgier, non-white neighborhoods instead of the more tourist-friendly enclaves.

Alas, in episode 2 all that rarefied air escapes when the focus shifts from Elliot toward spoiled-brat Julie. Nothing against Stenberg, it’s more the fault of series scribe Jack Thorne (the smash film “Wonder”) getting needlessly bogged down in the psychodramas typical of a rebellious teenage girl. It’s all rather cliché and even a filmmaker as talented as Chazelle can’t find a path around it.

It worries me that Netflix is only making these first two Chazelle-directed episodes available to the press. Might this initially promising series be headed toward a flop? And, will it stupidly fall prey to the rote father-daughter conflict in lieu of the vastly more interesting dynamic between Elliot and Maja? Only time will tell, but I fear “The Eddy” will be revealed as less a masterpiece and more of just the same old jazz.